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After February 26's Trade Deadline, Vegas GM George McPhee held a conference call to discuss his moves, which was highlighted by acquiring Tomas Tatar from Detroit.

It's a couple days late, but here's the full transcript from the half hour-plus call. Special thanks to the Golden Knights communications staff for providing this:

Opening Statement…
Thank you everyone for joining us. Before we get started, I have a couple of comments to make about what’s transpired here. We ended the deadline wanting to improve the team and we accomplished that. We had a surplus of picks and we had a lot of cap space. We used those to our advantage in these deals. We still have a surplus of picks and we still have cap space moving forward. In the next four drafts, we have 11 picks in the first two rounds. We wanted to give Brendan Leipsic an opportunity with another NHL team and did so; we hope it goes well for him. Other than that, we did not take any players off our roster and we added depth and skill and we kept our team together. For our fans, this was our first time though a deadline and for all of us, it’s always an exciting time of year when you’re in the playoff hunt. The deadline has passed and this is our team now. We are excited for the stretch run and we know our fans are too.

Thoughts on the message that their movements at the trade deadline …
I guess it can be construed that way. We’ve believed in them all year long. They’ve played very well so far and we wanted to keep them together to see what they could accomplish. If we could help them, we wanted to and we believe that our team has improved. We didn’t take anything out of our lineup. To clarify that point, I didn’t want to give up any of our young players. I didn’t want to take anything out of our lineup. I didn’t want to give assets away for rental players. We were delighted to be able to pick up Tomas Tatar for draft picks and to pick up Ryan Reaves and a 4th round pick a few days ago in a smaller deal.

Thoughts on Tomas Tatar and the type of person he is for team chemistry…
He’s a real quality person. We did our homework on that, as well as Ryan Reaves. Kelly McCrimmon and [Reaves] have known each other a long time and I had a long discussion with him about Tomas Tatar. He’s very excited to be here and I had a great discussion with him about an hour ago. There will be no chemistry issues and in fact, I think it enhances things in our locker room. We added a couple of people that are mature, quality people and proven players. We’re delighted to be able to add these players because they do improve our club.

Thoughts on what the added players have said to him about joining a first-class organization…
You know when you talk to the player whether this is something that caught a player off-guard, something that they were hoping for, whether they were not happy about it or really excited about it. You can tell by what they’re saying and the way it comes through with their voice. Both of these players are really excited to be here and we’re very excited to have them and excited that they’re excited.

Thoughts on what he saw in Tatar and the role he’ll play…
He’s a younger player, only 27. He’s quick, competitive and he can score. He scored 20 goals a season over the past three years and he’s on pace to do it again. We didn’t want to trade draft picks for someone that’s not going to be here after the summer. He has three years left on his contract and we’re happy about that. Where he plays in the lineup is up to the coaching staff. He can play left and right side and he can play up and down the lineup. We just added another good player to our team and again he’s a mature player, but he’s still young.

Thoughts on how hesitant he was to give up three draft picks…
It was easy because we acquired all of those picks and said we were either going to use those picks to draft players or acquire players. This is an example of acquiring a player. The picks that we gave up are spread out over four drafts. We have lots of picks and to spread them out over four drafts was not a problem for us. It was the way we were hoping to do it today.

Thoughts on his pursuits of Erik Karlsson and what he would’ve liked about having him…
I’m not going to comment about specific teams or players. I can tell you that we were very aggressive. We were buyers at this deadline and we were happy with where we are. We did improve our team; we didn’t take players out, we kept our young players, we used surplus picks and cap space to accomplish our goals. We had many discussions with many teams over the past three weeks and explored a lot of things. As we debrief today, we are very happy about what we accomplished and that our team has improved.

Thoughts on how tempted he was to look at his own unrestricted free agents and possibly cash in…
I wasn’t at all interested in moving any of our players. The team deserves to be together. They play well and we kept them together for a reason. We were aggressive in doing that as well. We’re trying to win right now and you go through things. I really like what our team has accomplished so far and I wanted to them to keep it together and that’s all there is to do it.

Thoughts on when did he and his staff came to the point where they decided that this was the direction they wanted to go to…
We went into the deadline with one thing circled on our and that was adding one more top-nine forward and we accomplished that today. We’ve been aggressive over the last three or four days talking with teams and certainly over the last three weeks. We were aggressive in trying to keep our team together and not picking players out of our lineup and not giving our young players away. We used draft picks and I’m repeating myself but we said last year when we acquired all of the picks, we’ll use them to draft players and we’ll use them to acquire other players.

Thoughts on the attractive aspect of Tatar and knowing that he was a guy they wanted to target…
I don’t know how many conversations I’ve had with (Detroit GM) Ken Holland, there’s no doubt it’s in the double digits, but we’ve talked a lot. We’ve talked as far back as a month ago and we’ve continued to be consistent and continue talking. We’ve had a lot of correspondence today with a lot of talking and a lot of texting. He was a guy we talked to based on where the prices would be the right guy for us. Most of the things you do in this business you like to do is because you base your decisions on data and they’re data-driven. At the trading deadline, things are market-driven. This is the price that he was comfortable with or he wasn’t going to trade him. This was the price that we are comfortable to get him now. He could’ve held onto him through the summer but we wanted him now.

Thoughts on acquiring Philip Holm and when he became on his radar…
We talked about that over the last two or three days. He’s an offensive defenseman with some upside. He’ll go to the Chicago Wolves for right now and we’ll see how it goes for him. We like his upside. He’s played well in different places and we’ll see what he could do for us.

Thoughts on at what point in the season he said that this team needs to stay together…
I don’t think managers ever really say we’re there or this is the team. You just go from game to game and as you get to the deadline like we’ve had, we say ‘is there anything we could do to help them?’ Based on the way they’ve played, we didn’t want to dismantle it. We didn’t want to pull anyone out and we wanted to keep it together and we felt good about that. That’s how we’ve operated; it’s how I’ve operated. You’re never comfortable that you’re this kind of team or that kind of team. We believe we’re a good team and I’ve got my fingers crossed hopefully that we can continue to be a good team for the rest of this season and see what develops.

Thoughts on how important it is to bring in guys that can play together or gel together…
We did our very best to keep an eye on people but at the same time, keep an eye on how the team is constructed and then keep an eye and invite the kind of people that we have. It’s how the team is constructed and it’s about the character and all those intangibles that are so important. We did the very best we could and so far it’s gone really well.

Thoughts on when is Tatar expected to join the team…
We expect him to be in Vegas sometime tonight. There’s no way with the things have went that he would’ve been in Los Angeles tonight but he’ll come to Vegas tonight and we’ll figure things out tomorrow.

Thoughts on the difference between this year’s trade deadline and the last time he went through this process in 2014…
They’re really similar. It’s a very intense period and can be stressful at times. You’re trying to help your club and make the right trades for your club now and for your club in the future. It’s a good question because they’re a very intense time and a lot riding on what you do. You’re trying to take care of your team, your players, your fan base and your franchise. As a manager, you bear all the liability. You always put together a tremendous staff and they’ve been very helpful. They were terrific through this period and I felt comfortable with everything that we were doing. As I said before as we debrief here, I think we did a very good job with this team. They’re improving this club keeping all of the things that are important to us here intact.

Thoughts on setting up market for future deals in the offseason…
Things can change a lot between now and the summertime. I haven’t spent a lot of time looking at that. I’ve been sort of in the moment here trying to improve our club and happy that we did. Nothing would really change for us in the summer. We have what I believe is a good team. We have lots of draft picks, cap space and we’re flexible and open-minded about what we could do in the summer. There are things that need to be done to make this club better. There are no restrictions for us.

Thoughts on having the aggressiveness him and his staff put forward today being seen moving forward…
I think we’ve been aggressive since the inception of the franchise. We’ve worked very hard to build a good team, to do the right things, to acquire good players, to acquire good picks, to build a terrific practice facility, to make sure everything works here and is a place the players to want to be. We will continue to be aggressive in building this franchise and doing the very best we can for this franchise. We’ve said a long time about our product we have here that it’s a great place to play, we have a terrific fan base, a great game rink to play in, a practice facility, an airport that’s close and easy to get around, great weather and no state tax. If we do our jobs, a lot of those elements in place, we could win. Nothing has changed and we’re going to continue to do the very best we can to build a winner.

Thoughts on making sure that they don’t upset the on-ice chemistry by adding Tatar and Reaves…
A lot of thought went into it and if you were making a couple of additions, of course you have to make sure that you’re doing the right thing. I think the most important thing is with both of these players, the rest of our players are going to welcome them here and he happy that they’re here. We get a big, strong guy in Reaves and we get another speedy player in Tatar and most importantly, be didn’t take anything out of the lineup. Other than Brendan Leipsic, who we needed to find another place for him to have a better opportunity, we didn’t take anything out of our lineup. None of our regular players are gone and we kept everyone. I think the chemistry will be even better. Our room will be even better and our team will be even better.

Thoughts on what they use when assessing talent and making decisions to add someone on the team…
There are a lot of layers. We have our pro and amateur scouting departments that are involved in all of these decisions. We have our analytics department that’s involved, our cap specialist, our ownership and our front office is involved in making these decisions. We know the players pretty well that we’re talking about. I like to think we have a very participative management style here where everyone is involved and everyone knows what’s going on. If something happens, we discuss it comprehensively and exhaustively and then try to make the best decisions we can.

Thoughts on Ryan Reaves’ personality having been one of the key factors of bringing him in the locker room as they are approaching the playoffs…
We’ve emphasized making sure we have good people in the room. If there was any time of the year that you could bring someone in that may not meet your standards, you could probably do it at a trading deadline if the player is a free agent you’re using him so a few months. Sometimes you can get away with that if you have a strong room but I think it’s really important that when you’re adding players that they are good-character people. We know that Reaves and Tatar are outstanding people and citizens. They represent this franchise really well on and off the ice.

Thoughts on seeing Reaves stay in Vegas long term…
It’s early in the process and as we’ve made clear for about six months now, unless we have some kind of trade to talk about, I don’t talk about the players’ status. Until then, I’ve never thought that it helps the process at all or the team to talk about it. I think you’ve probably learned by now that’s going to be my standard answer.

Thoughts on how much this team’s success surprised him personally and how much that role did that success play in what decisions he made in the trade deadline…
I don’t think anyone expected this team to be where it is at this point. We did the very best we could to build the best team we could. These are the results so far and all we want to do is focus on trying to win the next game. That’s what we’ve done all season long and that’s what we’ll continue to do. I don’t know how much the performance of the team to date has affected the deadline. Trading a first round pick would be inconsistent for an expansion team. What we’re doing is not too inconsistent with the overall plan. We wanted to be a good team and claimed a lot of young players in the expansion draft, players we were hoping would play well, players we expected to be here for a while and are going to be here for a while. With the exception of a few players, everyone we claimed is here for the long haul. I wouldn’t say what we’ve done here in terms of improving the team at the deadline is too inconsistent with the overall plan.

Thoughts on the Tatar deal being very close to the deadline and if it was a scramble acquiring him…
There’s always a scramble. If you talk to the guy at Central Registry, probably 90% of the deals were sent in between 2:45 and 2:55 ET or 11:45 and 11:55 PT. A lot of things are done at that time because of the salaries and [teams'] ability to maximize their return. Once a couple of [deals] go down, the others will happen. There’s not a lot that happens until the first couple of dominoes go down. It’s really not inconsistent with other trade deadlines I’ve seen. You basically have the framework in place with several teams and they know what they’ve agreed to, we know what we’ve agreed to. [Everybody] assists about seeing if there’s another deal happening that’s going to affect this, and if doesn’t, then we’re gone. That’s the way it goes and it’s not unusual for that to happen. I would say most of the deals happen very late in the day.

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